“ 'A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies', said Jojen. 'The man who never reads lives only one.' ” ― George R.R. Martin, A Dance with Dragons

Category: Fiction

Mother by Philip Fracassi
Blurb:Like the universe itself, the world of relationships can be mysterious, terrifying, beautiful, and ever-expansive. Within the cocoon of a marriage, the bond between two people can become predatory, often selfish. Emotions become conniving, thoughts turn deadly. And if that swirling organism of love and anguish blurs into the dark realm of the supernatural, anything can happen…

*I received a free copy of this book through Goodreads First Reads. I would like to thank Philip for the signed copy of his book.*

This novelette by Philip Fracassi was unsettling…in a good way. I love horror stories and horror movies, especially ones that have to do with the spiritual world and/or the occult. This book managed to give me a good horror story told in 40 pages. Since it was a novelette, I feel like I cannot reveal too much in my review (would hate to spoil anything). What I can say is that I especially loved the honesty from the narrator, Howard. It was eery reading his innermost thoughts. His horrifying ideas and things that he admitted to himself were scary all on their own, throw in a dash of the occult and you end up with a story along the same lines as Rosemary’s Baby (which I love btw). I say “along the same lines” but their plots are really not similar at all.

In a way, it’s a story we’ve all heard before but this time it’s told with a brutal honesty and the uncensored thoughts of the narrator (some pretty disturbing thoughts) which manages to change the way the story is experienced. The imagery and the descriptions really helped bring the story to life and send chills down your spine. I love the fact that I was able to experience a classic horror story scare in one sitting.

I definitely recommend this to anyone wanting to get a good horror fix.

Got the idea to do Jamie’s 2015 End of the Year Reading Survey from my best friend Brittany. If you fill this out, let me know, I would love to read it!

Number Of Books You Read: 42
Number of Re-Reads: 0
Genre You Read The Most From:

1. Best Book You Read In 2015?•Stand alone: All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
•Book in a Series: The Rithmatist by Brandon Sanderson

2. Book You Were Excited About & Thought You Were Going To Love More But Didn’t
Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie I hate to say that I really did not enjoy this book. Not the story but the way the story was told. I didn’t like that the author kept butting in and saying things like “we’ll see what happens..”. That bothered me so much.

3. Most surprising (in a good way or bad way) book you read?
•The Girl on the Train surprising because I did not expect that ending

4. Book You “Pushed” The Most People To Read (And They Did)?
•Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson
I push everyone I know to read this book and I only know of 2 so far that have. I’m hoping everyone will just read it so they can fall in love with it already.

5. Best series you started in 2015? Best Sequel of 2015? Best Series Ender of 2015?
•Started: TheRithmatist
•Sequel: Queen of Shadows
•Ender: Library of Souls

6. Favorite new author you discovered in 2015Sabaa Tahir

7. Best book from a genre you don’t typically read/was out of your comfort zone?•Tampa by Alissa Nutting
I think this is just considered Fiction which is a genre I always read. I chose this for “was out of your comfort zone” which is putting it mildly. I wouldn’t say it’s a “best book” but it was interesting.

8. Most action-packed/thrilling/unputdownable book of the year?•Queen of Shadows (Throne of Glass, #4) by Sarah J. Maas

9. Book You Read In 2015 That You Are Most Likely To Re-Read Next Year?•All the Light We Cannot See — I loved this book so much and I feel like it’s one that I will be re-reading for years to come.

10. Favorite cover of a book you read in 2015?

11. Most memorable character of 2015?
•Helene from An Ember In the Ashes by Sabaa Tahir.
Talk about a character with a lot of depth.

12. Most beautifully written book read in 2015?•Tie between All the Light We Cannot See and The Snow Child.

13. Most Thought-Provoking/ Life-Changing Book of 2015?•All the Light We Cannot SeeThis book. THIS BOOK.

14. Book you can’t believe you waited UNTIL 2015 to finally read?
•The Rithmatist

“What we read as adults should be read, I think, with no warnings or alerts beyond, perhaps: enter at your own risk. We need to find out what fiction is, what it means, to us, an experience that is going to be unlike anyone else’s experience of the story.”
― Neil Gaiman, Trigger Warning: Short Fictions and Disturbances

“In my old age, I see that life itself is often more fantastic and terrible than the stories we believed as children, and that perhaps there is no harm in finding magic among the trees.”
― Eowyn Ivey, The Snow Child

16.Shortest & Longest Book You Read In 2015?
•Life of Fred Apples by Stanley F. Schmidt at 124 pages.
•Queen of Shadows by Sara J. Maas at 648 pages

17. Book That Shocked You The Most
•Tampa by Alissa Nutting
By shocked I mean “wtf, omg, this is messed up, why did I decide to read this?”

18. OTP OF THE YEAR (you will go down with this ship!)•Adam and Ronan! pynch forever *begs for it to be canon*

•Gansey and Blue

19. Favorite Non-Romantic Relationship Of The Year•Mindy Kaling and BJ Novak. Yes these are real people and yes their friendship is perfect. Soupsnakes. If they decided to steer their relationship into romantice waters I would be on board that ship also.

20. Favorite Book You Read in 2015 From An Author You’ve Read Previously•Why Not Me? by Mindy Kaling

21. Best Book You Read In 2015 That You Read Based SOLELY On A Recommendation From Somebody Else/Peer Pressure:•Saga, Volumes 1-4

22. Newest fictional crush from a book you read in 2015?
•Dorian from Heir of Fire by Sara J Maas.

23. Best 2015 debut you read?
An Ember In the Ashes by Sabaa Tahir

24. Best Worldbuilding/Most Vivid Setting You Read This Year?
•Brandon Sanderson’s The Alloy of Law and also The Rithmatist. His world building is the best, hands down. These two books take place in two different worlds with two different magic systems and they are both amazing.

25. Book That Put A Smile On Your Face/Was The Most FUN To Read?
•Why Not Me? by Mindy Kaling This book had me in tears from laughter almost the entire time.

26. Book That Made You Cry Or Nearly Cry in 2015?
•I will preface this by saying…I cry over everything. EVERYTHING. If it’s sad, I’m crying. If it’s funny, I’m crying. If it’s sweet, I’m crying. So I will list a few that brought tears to my eyes for sad moments because I think that’s what this question wants…All the Light We Cannot See – I am shocked it did not take all of my tears.Queen of Shadows- my heart could not handle the Dorian chapters.Everything, Everthing – more tears
The Snow Child- Everything was beautiful. Everything was sad. Everything was happy and hopeful.
Why Not Me?- My tears are endless. I cried reading a book that is labeled “Humor”. In my defense, some chapters got real. I can’t help myself.

27. Hidden Gem Of The Year?•The Snow Child I seriously cannot believe I just heard about this gem in 2015. So beautiful

28. Book That Crushed Your Soul?
•The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo. Soul crushing because it made me realize how unorginazed and untidy I am. x______x

29. Most Unique Book You Read In 2015?
•Trigger Warning by Neil Gaiman

30. Book That Made You The Most Mad (doesn’t necessarily mean you didn’t like it)?
•The Unfinished Life of Addison Stone by Adele Griffin. Addison was such a special snowflake. Get that shit out of here. I want my $11 back. Nothing makes me more angry than wasting money.

1. New favorite book blog you discovered in 2015?•Priceiswong. I can definitely relate to her feelings towards our mutual books

2. Favorite review that you wrote in 2015?•uhhhhh I have really sucked at keeping up with this blog like I had planned. The reviews on this blog are few to choose from so I would have to go with my review of Paper Towns because I really let all my hate out.

3. Best discussion/non-review post you had on your blog?•cough….crickets…..
like I said….this blog has been neglected.

4. Best event that you participated in (author signings, festivals, virtual events, memes, etc.)?•When I went on a road trip to Nashville with my best friend Brittany to meet Sara J. Maas at her book signing tour for A Court of Thorns and Roses. Nothing beats singing the entire Les Miserables soundtrack at the top of your lungs, good food, listening to one of your favorite authors discuss her books, meeting one of your favorite authors and having her sign your book all with your best friend at your side.

5. Best moment of bookish/blogging life in 2015?
•…………………………more crickets…………………………

6. Most challenging thing about blogging or your reading life this year?
•Most challenging thing about blogging is actually finding the time to blog. I started homeschooling my daughter this year and working part time so that took up most of my time. Maybe this year will be better?

7. Most Popular Post This Year On Your Blog (whether it be by comments or views)?•I am pretty sure it was my review of Paper Towns.

8. Post You Wished Got A Little More Love?• not even going to answer this one…

10. Did you complete any reading challenges or goals that you had set for yourself at the beginning of this year?
•I completed my Goodreads Reading Challenge by reading 42/40 books!

1. One Book You Didn’t Get To In 2015 But Will Be Your Number 1 Priority in 2016?•A Thousand Nights by E. K. Johnston. I made sure to make this my January book club pick so that I could go ahead and read it. I’ve actually already finished it 🙂

2. Book You Are Most Anticipating For 2016 (non-debut)?•The Raven King by Maggie Stiefvater.

3. 2016 Debut You Are Most Anticipating?
•I am not sure I am anticipating any 2016 debuts. It may be slipping my mind at this moment.

4. Series Ending/A Sequel You Are Most Anticipating in 2016?
•Throne of Glass, #5. I am anticipating it but I don’t know if I’m emotionally ready.

5. One Thing You Hope To Accomplish Or Do In Your Reading/Blogging Life In 2016?•I really want to keep up with reviewing books and posting on this blog.

6. A 2016 Release You’ve Already Read & Recommend To Everyone:
• none

This was a lot of fun to fill out! It really got me thinking about each book I read last year…I don’t think I have missed any but I am sure I will find one that I should have added.

Rain Johnson escaped the insanity of her radical environmentalist family, only to end up waitressing for a living. Her scale of success—with her at the bottom—only goes as high as that college degree she never got, until she gets one hell of an epiphany from a Trinity Corporation public-relations guy who calls himself Jude. He tells her she’s the Lamb of God, and it’s time for that whole Second Coming thing. But when her first minor miracle gets her arrested and an ecoterrorist using the name Messiah starts blowing up pesticide plants, Rain and Judas are in for way more apocalypse than either of them expected.

Jude scrambles to save his personal plan for salvation, but Lucy, the devil herself, has her own well-laid plans. It doesn’t matter that Rain’s a conflict-avoiding lesbian and Jude is history’s worst traitor. They’re all that stands between humanity and an end of the world that wasn’t supposed to happen.

*i received a free copy of this book through Goodreads First Reads. I would like to thank Katrina for the signed copy of the book and the delicious cup of coffee.*

This is my first book to read by Katrina Monroe and I found her writing style similar to that of Christopher Moore; this book reminded me a lot of “Lamb” which is a book that I absolutely loved so I knew I would be enjoying this book.
I was pleasantly surprised to find that this book was as much about Jude/Judas as it was about Rain and I actually ended up liking Judas. I know, its blasphemous of me to like the traitor, right? but this book did a good job of depicting him as an ordinary guy who had a lot going on, made the biggest mistake of his life, has forever regretted said mistake, and is looking to redeem himself. So yeah, he was a bad guy but he’s trying to change that, leave him alone and as the Bible says, “let him who is without sin, cast the first stone…” –guess I’m disqualified.

Rain is a likable character as well, surprisingly go with the flow in her unusual circumstance but not unbelievably so. She’s just a girl in love, broke, not much going for her, crazy family and she’s just trying to make it one day at a time. Initially I thought she would not be a character I would like but I was proven to be wrong.

This book brings humor, real characters, and the fun hypothetical “what would I do if someone said I was the Messiah?”. I like to think that I would go around a hospital healing people all day long and was kind of sad that there wasn’t more healing in the book but I guess Rain did have the apocalypse to deal with. I’ll cut her some slack. The only blip for me while reading this book was when I came across something that I have seen before on Tumblr. I am very active on Tumblr which is probably the only reason I recognized it, this will probably not have any effect whatsoever on the average reader but for me I felt the book could have gone without it, only because I had experienced the humor of it before so finding it in a book caught me off guard. This does not mean that the content is not originally from the author because Tumblr is a vast world and I cannot even pretend to know where everything originated from.

Overall this was a quick, fun, weekend read for me and if you like Christopher Moore’s style, check out this book, you may find a new author to add to your list, ’cause she’s just getting started.